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> This is not some SciFi "and the Nanotech Gray Goo ate the entire earth in a week" story. Not yet.
by bregma 2y ago
> This is not some SciFi "and the Nanotech Gray Goo ate the entire earth in a week" story.
Not yet.
- bell-cot 2y ago"Life Finds a Way, Inc." has had a planet-sized laboratory, running its Natural Mutation Engine 24x7x365, for a billion-ish years now. But no Gray Goo has actually evolved, and taken over the Earth. Perhaps, "Gray Goo" is just another cool-sounding trope, and not a real-world possibility?
- immibis 2y agoGrey Goo has evolved in many incarnations. First was "unicellular life" edition. Most recently the planet has been taken over by "humans".
- jerf 2y agoPart of the Grey Goo memeset is that the goo is an unstoppable apex predator that doesn't just tweak the ecological balance a bit in a conventional ecological relationship, but permanently establishes an ecological balance of 100% Grey Goo. This has not happened, not even "humans".
- saulpw 2y agoNot yet, but the the human population has more than doubled since 1970, while the number of other vertebrates has halved. It's like biomass is conserved, and human growth (both in number and in waistlines) is us systematically converting biomass into ourselves. In 100 more years when the only vertebrates that aren't extinct or endangered are humans and our livestock and pets, will that be Grey Goo-like enough for you? Or does it only count if we manage to exterminate the insects and lower-order species too? Because an "unstoppable apex predator" could never become 100% Grey Goo, as it still needs something to eat! https://xkcd.com/1338/ https://xkcd.com/1338/
- undersuit 2y ago>Because an "unstoppable apex predator" could never become 100% Grey Goo, as it still needs something to eat! Grey Goo doesn't consume for energy but for mass; energy needs are plot devices. I'd argue the majority of human food consumption is for energy not mass so we can't approach the 100% mass of a grey goo event.
- lanstin 2y agoWe are the grey goo! Excellent idea.
- Retric 2y agoGenerally “Grey Goo” science fiction ignores the lack of metals in the environment thus preventing the grey in Grey Goo as well as energy constraints etc. However, simply outcompeting organic life using the same atomic building blocks would be a real problem for existing life forms like humans.
- roughly 2y agoCyanobacteria might be the closest we’ve come.
- undersuit 2y agoYour example was a little too over my head and I started Googling for this simulator I might not have played with.